How to Install the Thule WingBar Evo Crossbars on a 2018 Kia Sportage

Colin: Hey everyone. It's Colin here at etrailer and today we have a 2018 Kia Sportage. Now we're going to go ahead and do a test fit of the Tooley wing bar Evo roof rack system. Now as you can see we have this mounted to the flush mounted side rails of our Sportage. This roof rack is going to allow us to get some of our favorite rooftop accessories loaded up, whether we have a bike rack, maybe a kayak carrier, maybe even a rooftop cargo box for a longer road trip where you want to conserve on space inside the vehicle. You can get any of those things loaded up on top of your Tooley roof rack.Now up top we have our 47 inch long wing bar Evo crossbars.

We have them in black right here but if you think your Sportage would look better with some silver crossbars, we do have that kit option available here at etrailer. Just check it out on our website. Now these wing bars have a nice aerodynamic shape that's going to help cut down on wind noise and drag, especially if you compare that to a standard square or round bar roof rack system. We have this nice rubber strip up top that's going to allow us to utilize T slot accessories. You can see how easy it is for me to flip over and open the end cap.

We just slide our accessories all the way to our desired location, tighten it down and we're good to go. There's no cutting of the rubber strip or anything like that so I think that's a huge bonus for it.Now right here we have our rapid podium foot pack and these are going to be connecting our crossbars to our flush-mounted side rails. Now right here we have a nice little plastic lock keeping our end cap on. It's not the best step to turn because anyone with a Flathead screwdriver or something can come up and unlock it. So if you want more security, there is the Tooley one key system where you can put some mock cores on it, get it locked up.

That's sold separately here at etrailer.And right here we have our fit kit. This is specifically designed for this Sportage. We have it tightened down. We have a nice rubber coated hook and rubber pad on top of our side rail that's going to help protect our side rail so it doesn't scratch or anything like that. When you've got everything secured like we do with the included tool, you just put the end cap back on.Now I want to give you guys a few measurements.

First from the top of our flush-mounted side rail to the top of our wing bar is going to be about three and three quarters of an inch. That's something to keep in mind. Free and low clearance situation just in case you run into one. With the Sportage, you probably aren't going to encounter anything like that. It is a shorter crossover SUV but keep in mind you have that height added to your roof. Now if we go from the top of our roof to the bottom of our wing bar, it's going to be three inches. Now that should be more than enough space to get your clamp on accessories underneath of your crossbar without risking damaging the top of your roof.And that space underneath our crossbar is also enough to be able to open up our moon roof. We can get that opened. One thing I do want to point out is that you can see that the moon roof comes up above the top of our roof, so the spacing between it there is a little bit less than when it's closed so any clamp on accessories that you have on here you want to keep in mind, there is a chance that might make contact, but with how it sits right now with the roof rack empty, we can definitely get our moon roof open and closed with no issues.Now this roof rack system does have a weight capacity of 220 pounds, so you should be able to get a lot of stuff loaded up there. Obviously be sure to double check with your Sportage's owner's manual, make sure your roof can handle that weight before you load it up. Well, now that we've gone over some of those features, let's show you guys how to get this installed on your Kia.And what we're going to do is get the back crossbar assembled. You can see that our front one's already installed. It's going to be the exact same process. So what we're going to do, flip over our crossbar, let's go ahead and get our kit assembled. What we're going to do is take our podium foot pack, you see this silver bar on the back side. So right now it's not in the correct orientation. You can see there's two holes right here but we need this center hole up. So what we're going to do is pull out like that, twist it 90 degrees. So now you can see there's a central hole right there so we'll push that back in and then what we'll do is feed this bolt right here into that center hole and get it threaded on.And you see it's threaded on just like that. Now we'll come over to our end cap and then we'll take that off and then take our podium foot pack and feed it into that channel right there. We'll put the end cap back on. So we'll just raise it over and get it installed onto our flush-mounted side rails. Now you can see these six holes on the backside of our flush-mounted side rails. We're not going to be utilizing them but we are going to place our podium foot packs right above them so that we get an accurate cross bar spread between our two sets and we did the same on the front crossbar as well.Now we'll just take our included tool and then tighten up our podium foot pack. I've already tightened up the other side so just need to get this side snug. No need to over tighten it. Once you can feel some tension, just go a couple more rotations, just make sure that it's very secure. You'll see right there secure. Let's go ahead and put our end cap on. And like we talked about earlier, what you can do is get a flat headed screwdriver or any other tool that's similar and make sure you lock up that plastic cap so the end cap stays on.And then when you're all done with the install, I always like to grab a hold of both of the crossbars and then give the vehicle a really good shake. So you can see right here, the entire Sportage is moving around, our roof rack is secure, so we're ready to load up our favorite rooftop accessories and then hit the road. Well, thank you all for watching and I hope this information helped you out. But that's going to do for our test fit of the Tooley wing bar Evo roof rack system on our 2018 Kia Sportage.

Questions and Comments about this Video

Info for these parts were:

Video by:

Andrew K

Video by:

Jonathan Y

Video by:

Jacob H

Video Edited:

Joshua S

Video Edited:

Jacob T

Video Edited:

Dustin K

Video Edited:

Chris R

Video Edited:

Zach D

Test Fit:

Colin H

Test Fit:

Carla M

Test Fit:

Hayden R

Installed by:

Cole B

At etrailer.com we provide the best information available about the products we sell. We take the quality of our information seriously so that you can get the right part the first time.

Your internet site is very well organized and easy to use...My order was shipped very promptly and included everything I ordered...All in all this was a simple procedure for what can be a complicated order. I would use your company again or recommend you to others. Your selection was broad and your prices fair.